The Raw Materials from which a Boy is Made
by NezumiPi
Summary: Scott Summers wasn't much of anything when he was taken in by Charles Xavier, not anyone's choice for soldier, let alone leader. For his part, Xavier had neither the desire nor the skills to parent a wayward teen. But it worked. Sort of. (A realistic look at day-to-day life at the very beginning of the X-men...leading up to something sinister.)
1. Chapter 1

_This is based on a mix of several different versions of the early X-men story. If you're not familiar with it, the gist is that Scott's parents died when he was young. He was sent to live in an orphanage in Nebraska. He then ran away and was taken in by a mutant named Jack Winters who mistreated him until he found Xavier. At that time, Scott was Xavier's only student. There's no clear sense of how long it was just the two of them. I've always found that dynamic fascinating, so that will be the focus of this story initially. The other first five will enter the story slowly._

* * *

The way it started was that they killed a man together.

It was self-defense, and their victim wasn't exactly a human being at that point, but the reality of the relationship between Scott Summers and Charles Xavier is that it began with violence.

Jack Winters had wanted his pet gun, his captive foster son, to kill a security guard who stood in between him and the final ingredient in his diamond transformation cocktail. Of course, Scott had already done a lot of bad things for Jack – mostly knocking down walls and blasting out tunnels. He'd even broken a woman's leg, although that was an accident. But he'd never killed anybody and he desperately didn't want to.

And then Charles Xavier showed up. Scott hadn't expected salvation to appear out of nowhere, and he certainly hadn't expected it in the form of a bald guy in a wheelchair, but he was scared and twitchy and prone to obey authoritative adults, so he did as he was told: lined things up and vaporized whatever was left of Jack Winters.

They never talked about it, the fact that a man died when they met.

* * *

"How many of us are there?" asked Scott, in between enormous gulps of pasta. He was a neat eater, fork in one hand and napkin in the other, but by no means a delicate one.

"Hundreds," said Charles, "at the least. And the number keeps growing."

"And they're all secret?"

"Some are visibly mutated, but most have a normal appearance."

Scott made a sound of acknowledgement before adding more pasta to his plate.

For well over a year now, Charles had been planning to assemble a team of mutants, to train them, educate them, and then to send them into the world as ambassadors of a new species. He had planned on a certain level of underlying confidence and competence. He had not been planning on an overly skinny child with all the leadership potential of a feral cat.

No, this boy was not here because he was the best choice as the conductor around which his band of mutants would rally. Scott was here because he had nowhere else to go and Charles was a softhearted fool.

Having finished his third helping, Scott stood, and without saying a word, started to do the dishes.

* * *

The more time Charles spent observing Scott, the more convinced he was that he would have to get to the next mutant earlier. Obviously, age 15 was too late. Scott was…defective.

The boy bit and clipped his nails obsessively, to the point that his fingertips were pink and raw. He flatly refused to allow Charles to handle his strange red glasses, even to examine them for just a moment. He had nightmares, horrible sweating affairs that he denied any memory of. He hoarded food, despite the fact that Charles explicitly commanded him not to – it attracted ants. He seemed to have little sense of how to interact with another human being. He was beyond awkward. He startled easily and crept about with his mouth hanging open. He looked down at all times, hair hanging into his eyes.

Mutants couldn't all be like this, could they? From what little verbal communication they had mustered, Charles had gathered that Scott was orphaned at a young age and spent several years in a Nebraskan children's home before running away and ending up in foster placement with Jack Winters. It was something of a mystery how Winters managed to obtain official foster parent status. Well, not that much of a mystery - Winters had mild psionic abilities. He'd allowed Scott to attend school when it didn't interfere with his schedule of robberies, perhaps the only kindness he'd seen fit to offer the boy. Was this simply the life that went along with being a genetic outsider?

Scott had located an oversized jacket. Turning the collar up, he managed to hide most of his head, up to the ears. He was, rather slowly, reading a book from Xavier's personal library, a WWII fighter pilot memoir called _The Blue Arena_.

"You're going to need a guardian," said Charles, after clearing his throat.

Scott straightened slightly, but he didn't look in Charles' direction. "You said I could stay here."

Charles suddenly felt ambivalent about that offer, but he said, "Of course." He added, "While you work on getting your powers under control."

"I don't want another foster parent. And I _don't_ want to go back to the orphanage."

"You're too young to apply for emancipation. Some legal arrangement will have to be made."

Scott's jaw lay slack, hair hanging over his glasses. Charles didn't need telepathy to know the boy was thinking about the survival pack he had surreptitiously put together and stashed in the garage. There were calculations on Scott's face: How far can I get? How long will the food last? How long will I have to scrounge for shelter before I look old enough to get a real job?

Charles did something impulsive. "I would be willing to be your guardian," he said, finding his mouth rather dry. "Not as a foster father, per se, but merely to fulfill the legal role," he added, not wanting to assume a depth of relationship that did not yet exist. There was a moment – he wasn't proud of it – in which he considered erasing the boy's memory of the last minute. He was building a team, not running a shelter. But no, it was said and he wasn't going to take it back.

Scott sunk into his jacket. "Right," he said emptily, "yeah."

* * *

"Gently…gently!" Charles jerked forward as Scott decided to accelerate considerably faster than the situation called for.

Preliminary testing of Scott's power had yielded minor destruction and no progress whatsoever toward control. He had obviously thought he'd disappointed Charles (which, in perfect honesty, he had), so the boy had busied himself for hours clearing out a garden patch that had long since gone wild. It was at this point that Charles had realized that he had no idea what teens these days liked – his only consolation was that Scott seemed equally clueless.

But, if there was one thing Charles remembered from his own adolescence, it was that every kid wanted to drive a car.

So here they were, in an older car that Charles had never bothered to sell, stopped at an intersection while Scott turned the windshield wipers on, off, and on again in his search for the turn signal. The truck behind them was honking impatiently.

"It's the one on the left, Scott. Good, fine. Now, slowly into the-" Charles cut himself off, a smile creeping onto his face, because they had apparently found the one learning curve that worked in Scott Summers' favor. Whatever bumps there had been at the beginning were now smoothing out and the boy was actually driving reasonably well. He signaled again and changed lanes before turning left onto a country highway. Charles couldn't miss the smile, faint and flickering as it was, when they passed a sign indicating a higher speed limit was now in effect.

* * *

"Now, I'd like to speak with Scott privately."

"Might I suggest the library?" asked Charles. "Turn left, end of the hall. I'll send him along."

Catherine Mirwis was feeling a little overwhelmed by the sheer size of the mansion, not to mention the elegant furnishings. She was a government employee and unused to luxury. The library was clearly home to a host of first editions, along with more recent texts about just about every subject. She was still reading spines when the door creaked open, startling her.

"Sorry," said the boy when she jumped. He was scrawny, underfed, and clearly just beginning his growth spurt rather than approaching its end. He was wearing strange red sunglasses despite the dim lighting. Even so, he kept his face angled down and to the left, mouth hanging slightly open. It wasn't immediately clear whether his shoulders were hiked upward or his head was hunched down, but either way, he looked like a turtle half-drawn into its shell. He was a toe-walker, she noticed, possibly due to anxiety, or a lingering effect of the brain damage. His hands hovered in front of his body as if he had no idea what to do with them. When he stepped forward, closer to the lamp, she could see fading bruises on his throat.

"No problem at all," she said, kindly. "Do you want to take a seat?" she gestured toward a straight-backed leather chair on one side of a chessboard. She sat down on the opposite side.

The boy didn't answer verbally, but he settled on the very edge of the chair.

"My name's Catherine and I'm a social worker." She paused, waiting to see if the boy introduced himself. When he made no attempt to do so, she continued, "And you're Scott. I want to start by saying that you're not in trouble, no matter what you tell me. My goal here is to help you. I don't work for the police and it's not my job to punish you for anything you've done in the past. I also want you to know that things you're telling me are not private. The goal of this conversation is to establish the facts of your situation before the law. If I ask you a question and you don't want to answer, please don't lie. Just say, 'I don't want to answer that,' and we'll move on to the next question. Do you understand all of that?"

"Yes, ma'am." His voice was still rather high, fitting his frame rather than his age.

"Why don't you tell me how you met Charles Xavier?"

"I was walking outside. It was raining. He was driving by and he offered me a ride."

That simple story opened up several questions, like, _Why were you walking in the rain?_ , but Mirwis had learned it was often best to first work chronologically, before delving into the specifics. So she said, "And then what happened?"

"He said he'd drive me home. I said didn't want to go home. He said he had a spare bedroom where I could stay a few days."

Mirwis looked at Scott's file. "Home was with Mr. Winters, is that correct?"

Scott nodded.

"Were you running away?"

"Not really. I didn't have a plan. I just wanted to get away for a little while."

"Why was that?"

"I don't want to talk about that."

"Good," she always praised interviewees when they declined to answer, "thank you for telling me." It was so much easier than sifting through lies and confusions. Of course, they were going to have to settle on some kind of reason why Scott wanted to sever his relationship with Jack Winters – well, that was if anyone could _find_ Winters. He hadn't been seen for weeks.

Mirwis was about to ask another question when she realized that she could hear Scott breathing audibly in quick, sharp inhalations. Without saying anything, the boy took his shirt off and stood up, arms held out to the sides. He had the wispy beginnings of underarm hair and a trio of freckles above his navel. Even behind those tinted glasses, she was sure he was looking right at her. There was a mass of brown and yellow over his ribs on the left side of his chest – a bruise well on its way to healing. On his right shoulder, there was a circular scar the familiar diameter of a cigarette. "Can you turn around, sweetheart?" asked Mirwis, temporarily forgetting she was talking to a teenage boy.

Scott complied silently. There were lines of little scabs and more bruises in various stages of healing, including one in a strange question-mark shape. _A dog leash_ , Mirwis realized. She hated the aspect of her job that had gotten her so good at identifying weapons by the marks they left. She noticed that Scott actually straightened and calmed as she looked him over. She wasn't sure what that meant.

So he was willing to communicate, just not to say it aloud. That was fine. "Did Jack Winters cause those injuries?" asked Mirwis.

Scott nodded, putting his shirt back on and settling back into the chair. This time, he sat further back with his sock-feet balanced on the edge, knees subtly blocking his chest.

"I'm very sorry that happened to you," said Mirwis. It was what she always said and it was always the truth. Predictably, it got no reaction. She went on to the next question. When it came to teens and disrupted placements, rape, statutory or forcible, was often a concern. "Did Mr. Winters ever approach you for sex?" The wording was careful, honed over many years, to encompass the experiences of children who saw themselves as victims as well as those who believed they were equal partners.

"No," said Scott. "I don't think he was into boys."

She thought about going through the neglect questions, but the boy was obviously underfed, and the physical abuse evidence was plenty clear. She decided to skip them for now.

"Scott, this is by no means a criticism of you, but I'm wondering why you chose to get into Mr. Xavier's car."

Scott smiled. Well, not quite a smile, but a fraction of one, a hint of one. "Did you ever wonder how he was driving a car? He can't press the pedals, can he? He's got these levers, hand-operated, for the accelerator and the brake. I could see them. Only paralyzed people have cars fixed up like that. So I figured, if he's paralyzed, he can't beat me up. He's not going to ask me to-" Scott omitted the request with a blush. "It was a gamble, but it wasn't stupid."

* * *

"I have one last question for you, and it's awkward. People sometimes get offended."

Charles gestured for her to go on.

"I need to know what your expectations are for this adoption." She exhaled audibly, almost a sigh, then continued. "When children are adopted in infancy, they do just as well as natural-born kids. But Scott will be a different case. He's not a blank slate. He's got fifteen years of life, including a brain injury and an abuse history." She fixed Xavier with an earnest stare. "We find that in cases like this, the adoption has the best chance of succeeding if the parents are prepared for the possibility that their new son or daughter may never love them back."

"Are you asking if I know what I'm signing up for?"

"Yes."

"I don't think any of us can know that," said Charles. "I'm certainly not holding out for father-son hiking trips." People were uncertain what to make of his disability, and their uncertainty made them hesitant. He usually tried to smooth things over in the interests of advancing the status of the physically disabled, but in this case, social taboo could be played for mental manipulation just as effectively as telepathy.

Mirwis opened her mouth as if to speak, then shut it again, obviously unsure what to say.

Xavier tented his fingers, pensive. "There is a long tradition, stretching back to the Medicis in Italy and centuries before, of idle wealthy men sponsoring talented youth. If the only role that Scott is able to accept for me in his life is that of patron, then I shall still count myself lucky."

Mirwis smiled gently. The whole situation seemed so unbelievable to her, like something out of a Saturday afternoon B-movie. Here was an unattached, childless, paraplegic millionaire, and there was a fifteen-year-old orphan, pathetically shy and downtrodden. See them come together in a heartwarming tale of plot holes and dramatic chords. This sort of thing _never_ happened. But if what Xavier was saying was true, the situation would certainly be of benefit to Scott, couldn't possibly be worse than another foster home or group placement. _You just won the lotto, kid_ , she thought. Aloud, she said, "Well, it looks like all of your paperwork is in order. I see no reason that we can't get the judge to sign off on these forms within the week."

"That's wonderful," as he wheeled around the desk to lead her back out.

"You're very organized," complimented Mirwis. "I can't believe you already had a completed homestudy."

"Yes," agreed Xavier, "that _is_ hard to believe."

* * *

"Scott, I must ask. Why _did_ you decide to trust me?"

"I already said. I know you were listening when I was talking to her."

"Yes, but the walking-in-the-rain story was a lie, though your on-the-spot improvisation about my modified car was very clever."

Scott worried his lower lip. "I don't trust you," he said, "not completely. I just trusted you enough to help me with Jack, and that…well, it worked, didn't it? And so I trusted you enough to stay here for a few days, and it hasn't been so bad, so now I guess I trust you enough to stay here for a while longer."

"Because my paralysis means that I cannot possibly physically or sexually assault you?" asked Charles, echoing what Scott had said to the social worker.

"She doesn't know about your powers, so she believed that. I'm not stupid. If you wanted to beat me up, you wouldn't use your fists – you'd use mine. Or you'd make me bash my head into a wall." Scott glanced at Charles before looking down again. "And I don't know what you like for sex, but if you wanted to make me do it, you could take over my brain and I wouldn't have a choice."

"I sound like a very dangerous man."

"You could keep me from running away, I think. You could even make me think I'm happy here and that I don't want to run away. I don't know how I could tell the difference between that and really wanting to stay. You're a lot more dangerous than Jack was."

"And yet, you lied to a social worker to ensure that you would be allowed to stay. Why?"

Scott sounded strange and a little bit sad. "Because I'm dangerous, too."

"And because I let you drive?"

"And because you let me drive."


	2. Chapter 2

A mouse darted across the hallway. Charles wheeled after it and, looking behind the bookcase where it had dashed, gave an exaggerated sigh. Two boxes of crackers and half a dozen apples.

 _Scott!_ he called mentally.

"What?" Scott's vocal response could barely be heard as he was several rooms away.

 _Answer with your thoughts,_ said Charles. _It's rude to shout_.

Scott trotted down the hall and appeared in the doorway. "Fine, no shouting," he said, having conveniently ignored the request to communicate mentally.

Charles pointed to the food on the floor, staring at Scott with disapproval. "There is plenty of food," he said. "You have money for food. You have free range of the kitchen. Stop doing this."

"Yessir."

Charles didn't have to be a telepath to know the boy had no intention of complying.

* * *

Before meeting Charles Xavier, Scott Summers only had one source of information about rich people: the movie star and his wife from _Gilligan's Island_. It wasn't like he'd watched the show a lot, but the kids in the orphanage had liked the reruns, so he'd caught an episode from time to time.

The key information _Gilligan's Island_ taught Scott about the wealthy was that they owned a lot of clothes and were very concerned with their hair. He'd even remarked on it, when he was ten and trying to read a book while the other kids watched TV: "I just think they really overpacked for a three-hour-tour."

The professor didn't fret about hair since he was bald, but he did seem to own a lot of clothes, nice ones that fit him well and made him look distinguished.

Since coming to live at the Xavier estate, though, Scott had noticed quite a few other differences between the rich way of doing things and the normal way.

There was a big difference in what the professor would call 'culture'. Normal people went to movies; rich people went to _plays_. (The professor took Scott to one, something abstract about a woman who was having an affair – Scott couldn't follow the plot.) Normal people watched TV or got high to relax; rich people had _hobbies_. (The professor's hobby was chess. He played in a club on Wednesdays.) Normal people read cheap paperbacks; rich people read _literature_. (The professor handed him a copy of _Othello_ and encouraged him to give it a try, but Scott found it impenetrable.)

There was also a difference in money, not just in how much, but in what it was and how it was handled. In Scott's experience, you either had money or you didn't, but either way, it just sort of sat there and existed. But to rich people, having money took effort. The professor spent several hours each week on what he called, 'the business of the estate,' which had something to do with investments and banking and taxation.

There was a final difference, although Scott was not completely sure it was due to wealth. It was a sort of confidence – no, not confidence exactly, because Scott had known many confident poor people – but almost an obliviousness, a sense that things were fine and if by some chance they weren't now, they would be soon. For example, the professor had seemed confused when Scott said he couldn't remember the last time he went to the dentist. He had repeated the question, as though Scott were being deliberately obtuse. He was genuinely surprised that Scott didn't know his own suit measurements. He took in orphans who could very easily rob him blind – well, maybe…that depended on how honest Xavier was in his promise to stay out of Scott's head.

* * *

Charles Xavier was Scott, in the dream. Scott claimed he never remembered his dreams, even though he woke trembling and sweating, sometimes with a yelp or a whimper. He often lingered between sleep and wakefulness, trying to claw his way out of a dream that he couldn't identify, but dreaded resuming nonetheless. Charles' curiosity had led him to rationalize a small intrusion, to convince himself that it was for Scott's own good.

Dream-Scott was a good deal smaller. A child, a young child. He had a terrible headache and he could not see. There were tight bandages over his eyes. He was only partially awake, but he realized that his hands were restrained – not cruelly, with handcuffs, but with soft wristbands. If he focused on the sensations along his skin, he could feel the soreness of an IV, the stickiness of monitor leads, the heaviness of a feeding tube. He wanted to scratch at and push away the things attached to his chest and face and arms – probably why he had the wrist restraints.

There were hands on his genitals, lukewarm and smooth. The smoothness was rubber gloves. This was not right. He knew that. He had learned about good touch and bad touch and private parts and no one was allowed to touch his private parts. The hands – the people the hands belonged to – were talking, but he couldn't understand their words. They sounded stretched out and smashed together and loud and quiet. All he knew was that someone was holding his penis and he didn't like it. He knew what he was supposed to do. He was supposed to say 'no' and tell his mom and dad. He cried out for his parents, but his voice sounded soft and strange, even to himself, and they didn't answer.

There was something cold and hard at the tip of his penis. And then, and then, a sensation he couldn't describe, one he had no point of reference for. His penis felt stretched on the inside as the cold thing entered him. It hurt and it felt wrong. He could feel his bladder empty and he feared he wet the bed.

At that moment, Charles realized what Scott was dreaming about: they had catheterized him while he was hospitalized after the crash. Probably many times, but this particular instance must have stuck in his head because he was conscious enough to register it, but not clear and mature enough to understand the necessity of the procedure. This wasn't abuse, just an unfortunate reality. He could understand how Scott could still be both frightened of the memory, and ashamed of his fear, knowing now that the hands which had assaulted him belonged to responsible nurses, not heartless pedophiles.

It was strange, Charles realized, that he had taken so long to recognize the insertion of a urinary catheter when he self-catheterized multiple times per day. Of course, Charles had no idea what a catheter _felt_ like, and the young Scott had no idea what it _looked_ like.

Charles exited the dream gently, on psychic tiptoes so as not to disturb his sleeping ward.

* * *

"Why?" asked Scott, finishing off his second bowl of breakfast cereal, despite the time being 2:30 PM.

"To make a backup copy, if nothing else," said Charles. He would have thought that would be self-evident. A flimsy pair of metal-rim glasses were all that held back Scott's powers, since he apparently had no control over them at all. "Perhaps something more like goggles, something that attaches more firmly."

"You can _take_ them from me if you really want to, but I'm not handing over my glasses." Scott had an annoying habit of being utterly literally accurate, and he knew that he couldn't stop Charles from doing whatever he wanted.

"Why not?"

"Because then I have to sit around blind."

Which could mean just about anything. Scott was a little old to be afraid of the dark, but sitting in enforced sightlessness would unnerve just about anyone. Maybe bullies had taken his glasses for kicks. Maybe Winters had taken them for punishment. Maybe he had simply misplaced them and been forced to paw around blindly in the absence of a concerned parent or friend.

It wasn't irrational, that Scott didn't fully trust Charles, not with something so vital. And yet, Charles needed to examine the glasses long before that confidence could realistically be expected to develop.

 _Don't wait for trust,_ thought Charles to himself. _Don't argue with his logic. You can't convince him to ignore the evidence of his own life. Don't fight the defect – replace it with a strength._

"Look," said Charles, without preamble. He drew a coin from his jacket pocket and held it up. "A quarter." He dropped it on the floor. "Close your eyes. You know where it is. Pick it up."

Scott obediently dropped to his hands and knees. "Do I at least get to keep the quarter?" he asked. He pawed at the floor systematically, starting several feet from the coin, and eventually brushing it with his fingertips. He raised it over his head, less in a gesture of triumph than an expression of 'Are we done yet?'

"Put it back down on the floor. Right there where you are. Keep your eyes closed. Walk to my study, then back and find the coin."

Scott shuffled slowly, feeling in all directions and clinging to the wall when he found it. Still, he didn't open his eyes, nor did he ask for verification that he'd found Charles' study. He turned around and went back the way he came, feet dragging over the floorboards. He was mouthing silently to himself. He dropped to his knees too early, four or five feet away from the quarter, but he still found it more quickly than he did the first time.

"Again," said Charles.

Scott was walking more normally now, lifting his feet, however fractionally. His hands hovered with more purpose, seeming to expect landmarks.

"Again," said Charles.

Scott was counting his steps now, reaching out to doorways for confirmation of his position, rather than grasping at them like life preservers. It was a shockingly quick transformation. He stopped inches from the quarter and knelt on one knee, reaching to the left where he knew the coin was. Scott stood and pocketed the quarter. "Thanks," he said, opening his eyes for the first time in twenty minutes.

Charles held out his hand expectantly, though he wasn't sure whether he was requesting the glasses or the quarter.

Scott was whispering to himself, _"Six steps to the tile. Five steps to the pantry. Eight steps to the hallway,_ " not even looking in Charles' direction. Still, he took off the red glasses and held them out.

"A trade," said Charles. He pressed his pocketwatch into the boy's palm. "Listen to it tick. Count the seconds. I'll return your glasses before you reach three hundred."

Scott's mouth was still hanging open, but he wasn't whispering step counts anymore. He held the watch to his ear. "Six minutes," he said, "or I blow a hole in the wall."

* * *

Charles taught Scott the rules of chess, as well as a few simple strategic guidelines – controlling the center, castling early, keeping knights away from the edges – but the boy hadn't taken to the game. Charles found this immensely disappointing. The purpose of chess was to develop strategic thinking, the sort that would be needed in combat; Scott's ineptness did not bode well for his eventual role on a team.

Except…Scott wasn't really _bad_ at chess, so much as he wasn't really _playing_ chess. He kept insisting that he wanted his pawns to use their turn to dig traps for the horses and trying to argue that he should be allowed to put another piece inside of his rook as some kind of mobile battlement.

* * *

Scott suddenly lunged to the left, bringing his hands together in perpendicular arches. "Got one!" he cried, pleased with himself. He returned to the path, holding his prize out to the professor. "You want it?"

Charles smiled at the slow pulsing glow of the firefly. "That's quite all right." They were taking am after-dinner walk along the paved paths of the property.

Scott shrugged and opened his hands, letting the bug crawl along his fingers. "I like these guys."

"You look happy."

Scott clearly thought that was a very strange thing to say, because he knitted his brow and completely failed to respond.

"What makes you happy, Scott? Besides fireflies."

"I'm happy when no one's pushing me around." Scott blew gently on the insect on his finger, encouraging it to fly away.

"That's not happiness; that's the absence of fear."

"Well, then I don't think I understand the question." Scott shrugged. "What makes _you_ happy?"

"Many things. A good book, going to the theater, an evenly matched game of chess." Charles gestured to indicate that the list could continue. He waited to see if his contributions would spark any response from Scott. When none was forthcoming, he added, "When I was your age, I liked models."

Scott drew his chin to his chest and raised his shoulders, blushing and making himself smaller. "I don't really-"

"The kind you assemble," clarified Charles. "Such as model planes. Not the kind you photograph. Though, I suppose, most young men enjoy the other kind as well."

"I like airplanes," mumbled Scott quietly, almost inaudibly. "Real ones. Not just models."

It was gratifying for Charles to finally hear Scott express some kind of interest or desire, some will to _approach_ a goal instead of just avoiding harm. They took the long route around the grounds as the sun set.

"Why do they stop?" asked Scott. "The fireflies. Why don't they light up when it's night?"

"I'm not sure, but all animals live in a state of constant balance between long-term goals and immediate survival. I have to imagine that whatever goal is served by their luminescence is eventually outweighed by the increased risk of predation."

Scott said nothing for a moment, clearly processing what he had just heard. Finally, he said, "You're really smart."

Charles ignored the compliment, unsure how to respond. "Do you think of yourself as intelligent, Scott?"

"No." This was said in a matter-of-fact way, without self-pity.

"Why not?"

"If I was smart, I wouldn't haven't gotten caught up with Jack Winters."

"I don't think that was a matter of intelligence. Mr. Winters exuded a low-level psionic field to which you had no resistance."

"But you could resist it."

"I believe that as a telepath, I have some natural resistance to others' telepathy. I also have practice."

"You can learn that with practice? I mean, could someone else? Someone who's not a telepath?" asked Scott, unable to keep the eagerness out of his voice.

"It certainly seems possible," allowed Charles.

"I want to study that." There was an intensity in Scott's tone, sounding almost greedy. He added a perfunctory, "Please."

"You would have to allow me to probe your mind. You can't learn without a challenge."

"Like environmental pressures that promote evolution," answered Scott.

Charles knitted his brow and pressed his lips forward. This was a pleasant surprise. Scott had described himself as a mediocre student, and his school records more-or-less corroborated this. The boy had just demonstrated a good understanding of evolutionary biology in the form of a meaningful, if obscure, analogy. "How did you know about that?"

"The director at the orphanage really liked Darwin," said Scott, as if that were the most normal thing in the world. He caught another firefly. "I really like these guys."


	3. Chapter 3

Scott Summers awoke in a comfortable bed. He himself wasn't comfortable, but that was because he really never was; it was hardly the bed's fault. The mattress was in good condition – it wasn't lumpy and it didn't have any broken springs. The bedsheets were new and there was a quilt for warmth (that he never used). His glasses were tied onto his head with a shoelace, just in case he shifted position while he slept. (It hadn't happened yet, but that was no reason to take pointless risks.) He felt well-rested, which was a nice change. At the orphanage, he always got a full night's sleep, but never felt like it. He'd often awoken so tired, he wondered if he'd really been asleep. Now, though, he easily awoke at 6:30 without the use of an alarm clock.

He shut his eyes to shower, brush his teeth, and dress. There was something appealing about learning to function while blind, about knowing that he wasn't entirely helpless without his glasses. Scott couldn't for the life of him figure out what Xavier was going to do next, but he could at least eke every available ounce of predictability out of his environment. His comb was where he expected it to be. He liked that.

Scott liked the feeling of setting a goal and making progress toward it. He was getting better at navigating the mansion blind, which made sore knees and a foul taste when he mixed up toothpaste and antibiotic ointment worth it.

 _I'm going to go for a run,_ he thought at Charles. The professor had said he appreciated it if Scott told him when he left the house, and it was an easy enough direction to follow. It was the sort of thing that teens in books did, as long as their caretakers weren't evil or utterly blind to the plot.

 _Enjoy_ , came the professor's reply, but the psychic link didn't close immediately. _Scott,_ thought Charles, _this may be an odd question, and I want you to feel free to say no._ There was a pause. _Would you mind if I…observed your senses while you run? From time to time, I become nostalgic._

 _Sure, that's fine,_ thought Scott, but he simultaneouslyfelt an odd clenching sensation, just below his diaphragm, like he'd just been punched, which didn't make sense because the professor's request was perfectly reasonable. Kind of nice, actually, especially since he could've just gone ahead and done it without asking.

 _Thank you_ , thought the professor, and Scott could feel a tingling along his skin as the professor's astral form bonded with his somatosensory cortex. It was a plain, polite remark for a strange and invasive action. _If you become uncomfortable or would like to sever the connection for any reason, just imagine a door shutting._

Scott started down the front path at a slow jog, turning left into the garden. He wasn't a very good runner – he had never developed much endurance and his right foot tended to point inward. And yet, running was one of those tasks that was amenable to goals and regular progress toward them, so he had persisted.

 _Land on the balls of your feet, toward the center_ , coached Xavier. _Let me show you_.

Scott saw, rather than felt, his legs shift to the correct form.

 _You'll experience less strain that way._

 _How do you-?_ Scott cut himself off before he asked what felt very much like an overly personal question. He maintained the same speed, trying to force his legs to continue as the professor had demonstrated.

 _I ran track when I was your age. Hurdles, primarily._

Scott tried to imagine the professor as an active young adult and was unsuccessful. He returned his focus to running and found himself mentally singing a marching chant. _See that lady wearing brown? She makes her living lying down. She's a deep-sea diver, a deep-sea diver. See that lady wearing black? She makes her living on her back. She's-_

 _Scott!_ The professor's thought-voice sounded almost scandalized. _Where did you learn such a thing?_

 _I don't know!_ yelped Scott in his mind. He was red-faced and he wondered how much of that could be felt telepathically. _It's just one of those things you know._ He added, _I never really thought about what the words meant._

 _It's all right. It almost sounds like a marching cadence._

 _What's that?_

 _A military chant, like 'I don't know but I've been told,'_ Charles thought the last bit in a sing-song tone.

' _Eskimo pussy's mighty cold,'_ finished Scott, reflexively. "Eeep!" he shouted, covering his mouth his with hands. _Sorry! Sorry!_

Charles was laughing. Not a mean laugh, either. _Scott, I do believe you're a military brat. You must have overheard those songs as a young child._ His thoughts sounded delighted.

 _Why does that make you happy?_

 _Because your records from the state are extremely limited. This might mean we could find out more about your family of origin._

Scott imagined a door and slammed it. He continued to run down the path.

* * *

"And how does that advance the cause of mutantkind?" asked Charles into the phone. He sounded intense – angry, maybe, and also sad.-

Scott held his breath. He couldn't hear the answer, but if he was quiet, he might get to listen to a full half of the conversation. Having returned from his run, he had considered apologizing for kicking the professor out of his mind so abruptly, but now he was snooping, so it obviously wasn't a day for advanced social skills.

"The child is a mutant, too. What about _his_ well-being?"

Scott wondered if the professor was talking about him. And why.

"Well, unless you're willing to give me a location." A pause. "I thought not." Charles sighed. "You are a better man than this. I can't help unless…you have to see reason, Erik."

Who was Erik and why did he need help?

"The situations aren't parallel in the slightest and I won't allow you to pretend otherwise."

Scott could hear Charles' fingers tightening around the phone.

"No," said Charles, "I don't suppose there is. Goodbye, old friend."

* * *

There were two versions of Scott Summers, which Charles mentally categorized by their postures. _Toe Walker_ was awkward, jumpy, and prone to lurking. He didn't have much to say and when he did speak, he mumbled. Toe Walker avoided Charles, avoided everyone. He spent most of his time exploring the mansion and the grounds, but there was no sign of joyful discovery. Rather, he had the look of a skittish prey animal who was investigating a new environment for signs of predation.

 _Flat Foot_ emerged when Scott had a task and a goal. Flat Foot had a straighter posture and a louder voice. He still kept to himself, but he had the capacity for assertiveness. He was intense, with a capacity for anger and initiative. He was focused on his task instead of constantly hesitating and twitching.

Toe Walker expected defeat. Flat Foot was stubborn and willing to fight for victory.

Toe Walker was still terrified of temporarily parting with his red glasses, though Charles had been scrupulous about keeping them no longer than the promised limit. Flat Foot practiced walking the halls of the mansion with his eyes closed, memorizing landmarks and counting steps.

Toe Walker washed his hair with soap for a week and a half instead of asking Charles to add shampoo to the grocery order. Flat Foot eased the Chevrolet into the garage and asked, "When I get my license, can I drive the GTO?"

The solution, then, as far as Charles was concerned, was to ensure that Scott had clear tasks to complete as often as possible – assignments, rules, expectations. He'd spent the first six weeks of their time together offering a sort of humanistic support, allowing Scott to decide what he would do and when. It was apparently too much freedom, and no good for this particular child. There would have to be regular lessons, chores, and an exercise regimen, in addition to their attempts to exert some conscious control over the boy's optic blasts.

"Focus, Scott! This isn't a game!" Charles positioned himself well away from the boy, who was lying supine on the grass, eye beams pointed directly up. They had tried this exercise several times already and had only established that Scott could pass his hands through his beams without harm, which was interesting, but hardly the grand prize.

"I _am_ focusing," Scott groused.

"No, you're squinting. There's a difference. Focus your _mind_."

"I am! I don't know how to focus any harder!" He sighed. "I have a headache. Can I go do something else, now?"

"There is nothing else! Do you understand what you're capable of? If all that's holding your power back is these glasses, a mistake is inevitable. You'll knock over a building or push a bus off an overpass. And not only will there be a catastrophic loss of human life, it will be a disaster for mutant-human relations."

Scott's hand was on his glasses, but he made no move to put them back on. His jaw was set. Toe Walker was gone. This was Flat Foot. "You do it," said Scott. "You can take over my mind and make me do stuff, right? Make me do this. Make me focus and concentrate and all that stuff. Make me control it."

"That's certainly possible. With your consent?"

"Just for this, not to redecorate in there or something."

"All right," said Charles, though he had an odd feeling of dread about the possibility. He raised his right hand to his temple and allowed his psychic self to enter Scott's mind. When he'd spied on the boy's dreams and ghosted after him while running, he'd only visited the most surface thoughts, deliberately ignoring everything that lay beneath. Most minds were like nets: Each thought was connected to other thoughts, which was connected to other thoughts, and so on in a never-ending tangle. An inexperienced psychic could easily get lost, but Charles knew how to read those knots and strings like a map. None of that applied to Scott's mind. It was grey and inconsistent, like a skipping record or a book with missing pages. There was plenty of willpower, hard lines and sharp angles. There were mirrors and gears and levers. There were shelves, unlabeled and dusty.

It was fascinating.

And there was no link to his powers. Not to say that there was no mental representation of the blasts, but that there was no thread of thought leading from Scott's mind to his optic blasts. Charles found the remnants of such a control, tattered and charred, surrounded by warped and illegible charcoal scratchings.

"I'm sorry," said Charles aloud. "I've never encountered this before, but I believe I've located your brain damage."

* * *

There was peace. Scott ran daily and began lifting the weights that Charles' stepbrother had left in the attic. Charles started instructing his ward in classical academics, focusing on philosophy, history, and science. They never discussed the phone call, and Scott never overheard Charles talking to the mysterious Erik again. Likewise, Charles made no further overt attempt to ask after Scott's connection to the armed services (and if he queried a few contacts, he kept this to himself).

They had dinner together most nights. They weren't family, not yet, but their initial wary awkwardness had faded to merely Charles' normal standoffish demeanor and Scott's unexpressive face.

Scott was exhausted at the end of each day, but a good kind of exhausted, the kind that came from results, from work one could be proud of. He had stripped down to his underwear – he sweated a great deal in his sleep and saw no reason to wreck pajamas in addition to bedsheets – when he heard the professor's voice in his head.

 _Get dressed in your running clothes and sneakers. Meet me in the garage as quickly as possible._

Scott complied, thinking, _What's going on?_ as he hurriedly laced up his shoes.

 _There is a young mutant in trouble. He's being held in protective custody. There's an angry mob after him._

* * *

The estate was enormous. Bobby could have had a room half a football field away, but instead he had apparently chosen one right next to Scott's. Scott knew this because he could hear Bobby whimpering and sobbing.

 _Professor,_ hissed Scott. _Professor!_

 _Is this an emergency?_ Charles' thoughts sounded annoyed, not particularly alarmed.

 _The kid is crying,_ thought Scott. He saw himself as markedly older than Bobby Drake, even though they were only about a year apart. Scott and the professor had successfully rescued the boy from his predicament and brought him back to the Xavier mansion in a state of shock.

 _Then handle it,_ answered Charles. There was a feeling of a door shutting and the mental connection was broken.

Scott knew in that moment that he would have rather weeded a thousand gardens than 'handle' a crying boy. But he had a task and he was going to do it. He rolled from the bed gracelessly, steadying himself with his hands so he didn't make a loud thump against the floor. He slid a pair of shorts over his underwear and took a t-shirt from his clothes hamper. He wondered if he should brush his teeth. No, probably not.

Scott knocked on Bobby's door.

"Whatdoya-?" mumbled Bobby weakly.

Scott decided that meant, 'come in'. "Are you injured?" he asked. He could see Bobby in the dim light coming through the window, sitting on the floor with his back to his bed and his knees hugged to his chest.

"No. No? I mean, maybe a little bruised, but I'm okay. Except I'm not okay because I was just trying to help her and I didn't mean to hurt anyone and I don't know what's happening and people were trying to kill me and I want my mom and dad!" The last part was practically a wail.

"So, you're _not_ injured?" clarified Scott. He was still hovering in the doorway. "Because I know where the first aid supplies are."

"I just want to go home and wake up and find out that none of this is real."

"You should probably stop wanting that."

Bobby gaped at Scott before twisting his features into a mixture of snarl and pout. "Easy for you to say. Is the bald guy your dad?"

"No, I just live here." Scott didn't see the point in explaining the guardianship arrangement. And Charles had been clear – it was just a legal technicality.

"Don't you miss your parents?"

Scott thought about that. "Yes," he said finally, "I miss them." He sat down next to Bobby on the floor.

"It's not like I've never been away from home before," said Bobby. "I've had sleepovers. I've been to camp. One summer I stayed with my grandparents for almost a month. But I've never had anybody want to kill me before. That's not supposed to happen to kids."

"I don't think it's supposed to happen to anyone, except maybe enemy soldiers in a just war." Scott and the professor had been debating Just War Theory as a literary exercise while reading Thomas Aquinas.

"Aren't you scared?"

"Of human mobs? No, they should be scared of me," said Scott. From anyone else, that would sound like a threat – or perhaps tough-guy posturing – but he said it matter-of-factly, like a teacher gently correcting a student.

"Wow," said Bobby, "if this were a horror movie, this is when you would start making stuff fly around the room and spinning your head all the way around."

"The professor says there are mutants who can move things with their minds. Telekinesis, it's called."

"Oh god, there's gonna be creepy little girl twins and a little kid on a Big Wheel, isn't there?"

"Uh…there's no kids here," said Scott, clearly missing the reference. "Nobody younger than you, anyway. Just the professor and me and the staff."

Bobby didn't say anything for a long moment. He swallowed several times. "Thanks for talking to me," he said softly. "You should go back to bed. I'm just going to sit here for a while."

Scott stood up. He had a strong sense that he was supposed to say something. He settled for, "Breakfast is at seven."


	4. Chapter 4

_I'm sorry for the long delay between chapters. Unfortunately, real life is a thing that exists. In the future, I'll be aiming for about 1 chapter / week._

* * *

"Do you have any siblings, Scott? Cousins, perhaps?" Charles added a spoonful of brown sugar to his oatmeal. They were sharing breakfast with a certain degree of privacy, as Bobby Drake apparently liked to sleep in. That would have to be addressed eventually, but for now… Charles asked his question casually, as if there were no reason at all for his curiosity.

Scott shifted into full toe-walker mode immediately. He shrank back in his chair and his left hand crept around his cereal bowl protectively. "You have my file," he whispered.

"I do. It's markedly incomplete."

"It's embarrassing," mumbled Scott, through a mouthful of Raisin Bran.

Charles just waited and continued to eat his breakfast, confident that Scott would realize how silly it was to feel embarrassed in front of a telepath who had already heard humanity's worst secrets.

Finally, Scott said, in a voice almost too quiet to be heard, "He's imaginary. My brother. It was one of those survivor psychology things. I never really had a brother, but my mind made one up to…I don't know, it was one of those things people do to deal with bad things happening to them. Coping stuff. That's what the counselor at the hospital said. I know he's not real, but I remember him anyway."

"That's nothing to be ashamed of, Scott. That was your mind, determined to survive in the face of every child's worst nightmare."

"I lived at an orphanage," said Scott. "Lots of kids there lost their parents. They didn't all make up an entire kid."

"They're not you. A comparison can't be made." Charles took another bite of his oatmeal. "This imaginary brother…did he have a name?"

"Alex," muttered Scott, sounding thoroughly miserable.

Charles didn't react to the name. He said nothing at all for several minutes, continuing to slowly eat his breakfast.

Scott did the same.

Charles put down his spoon and said, "I wish you and I had gotten more time to get to know one another, before bringing others into the mix. Mr. Drake's situation forced my hand." Scott didn't have the confidence to be part of a team and he certainly wasn't going to gain it if his development as a mutant was continually sidetracked by other concerns. "Nothing seems to be going according to plan."

"Respectfully sir, that means you need a better plan."

"Maybe so." Charles laughed. Of course, the one time that Scott did seem confident was when he was _doing_ something, accomplishing something. When he was clearing the garden or learning to drive, he held his head straighter, his shoulders relaxed. He didn't look so young or so small. "Scott," said Charles, "I'd like you to be responsible for introducing Bobby to the mansion."

* * *

The professor was gone for the day, visiting "clients" (whatever that meant).

"How's he even a professor?" asked Bobby. "Doesn't that mean he teaches college?"

"He's some kind of part-time professor at Columbia University. He said it means he gets the privileges, but no pay and no responsibility. There's a word for it."

Bobby had perked up considerably after his first night of panic. He was presently collecting the frost from his hands and arms into an ad hoc snowball, which he proceeded to throw at a gardener, who for her part looked more perplexed than annoyed. "So that's what he's doing? Going to Columbia for college stuff?"

"I don't know. I didn't ask." Scott stopped to indicate a side door that was always locked. "I guess it can open, but it never does."

"Got it," said Bobby, now trying unsuccessfully to juggle pine cones while they walked. "So how long are you in for?"

"Huh?"

"I know, I know, this place is a lot nicer than juvie. But we are kind of stuck here, right? My mom says I can come home once it's safe. My dad says I can come home once I can turn my powers off." Bobby sounded a little sad when he said the latter sentence, an emotional beat that was somewhat softened by his continued failed juggling efforts.

Scott considered this for a moment. "I don't think…it seems like everybody here has different plans. I don't think the professor brought you here just to leave in a few months, but I don't know."

"It's kind of cheating for him to have secrets," mused Bobby, "because no one can have secrets from him. It would be like if I entered an ice sculpture contest."

"He's been having me read some history and philosophy books about conflicts. He talks about how it's not good to conquer your enemies, because then you still have enemies. Better to make peace with them."

Bobby looked profoundly skeptical. "You shoot _laser beams_ out of your _face_." He made explosive hand gestures to emphasize this. "I don't know what _he_ plans on doing with _his_ life, but _you_ don't really seem built for hugging and singing _We Shall Overcome_."

Scott tipped his head in slight agreement. At the very least, he would concede that he was certainly not built for hugging. "Maybe it's not really about us. I think he's friends with other mutants. I hear him talking to them on the phone."

"Other mutants?" A hungry look crossed Bobby's face. "Like who? Where?"

"One of them is some guy named Erik. I don't know the rest. I don't really make a point to eavesdrop."

"Erik, huh? C'mon!" Bobby took off running toward the house, Scott following in an awkward jog – Scott couldn't run full speed, because Bobby left irregular patches of ice on the ground behind him.

The professor's study was unlocked. Bobby immediately started rifling through the papers on the desk.

"Hey, you can't do that!" hissed Scott, though he wasn't entirely sure why he was being quiet.

"If he can read our _minds_ , I think we can skim his _mail_ ," argued Bobby. He shook his head. "There's nothing in here from an Erik." He turned to the phone and lifted the receiver. Crossing his fingers, he hit redial.

Scott was not comfortable with this plan, he was not comfortable with this plan at all and he was going to tell Bobby to stop right away or he would hang up the phone himself and-

"Hello?" The voice on the phone was deep and steady, almost regal.

Bobby did his best impression of Charles Xavier, which was – truth be told – a 6 out of 10 at best. "Erik?"

"Who is this?"

"Are you Erik?" Bobby tried again.

"If this is Charles's ward," said the man, "I have agreed not to interfere with you and he has extended me the same courtesy. I am a man of my word, so I must bid you good day."

The line clicked.

Scott raced forward and he hit redial again, this time hanging up before the phone could ring even once. He then began tapping different sequences of numbers until he had a sound that matched the redial sequence. He wrote his findings on a piece of scrap from the trash.

"What's a _ward_?" asked Bobby.

"It means an adopted child," said Scott absently. He was clearly still focused on what he man had said, silently mouthing, _he has extended me the same courtesy_. "Bobby," he said, "were you ever approached by anyone else about your powers or your mutation?"

"No," Bobby shook his head. "I only found out myself yesterday."

"So how does he find them?" muttered Scott, mostly to himself, without clarifying which 'he' was being referenced.

Bobby considered this while rubbing his hands together, trying to warm them enough that he could put the professor's letter opener back down.

* * *

Scott sat on the corner of the bench in the bank lobby. He was here, according to the professor, to "sign some documents." He didn't know which documents and he didn't ask. The bench was dark cherry and free of scratches or scuffs. Xavier sat next to him, wheelchair neatly aligned with the heavy bench, waiting patiently for the clerk to finish with the brown-haired woman seated at the desk. The woman's son, on the other hand, had clearly run out of patience. He was alternately trying to hang upside down from the other bench and clambering underneath it.

Xavier pointed to the child. "Imagine, Scott, if that little boy were to come over here, for no reason at all, and began to hit and kick you. What would you do?"

Little wrinkles appeared on Scott's forehead. It was a strange question – kind of stupid, really – but he took it seriously. "I would call for his mother and then just ignore him."

"Why? You're much bigger than he is. Surely you could best him in a fight."

"He looks to be about four years old."

"Preschoolers hit each other all the time," argued Xavier. "That's to be corrected, of course, but it's hardly a major moral transgression."

"I'm not a preschooler," said Scott. "I'm bigger than him. It wouldn't be a fair fight."

"No, it wouldn't. Of course, it wasn't very fair of him to start hitting you for no reason."

"He's a little kid. He doesn't know any better."

"So he's saved by his youth and ignorance?"

Scott just shrugged.

Xavier nodded as though something profound had just been said. He tented his hands pensively. "Now, look at the security guard." He pointed to a powerfully built man standing watch in the corner of the room. "He's bigger than Jack Winters, yes?"

"Um…yeah?" Scott's toe-walking personality was reasserting itself.

"What if that guard were to strike you?"

"I'd blast him."

"He might die. Does he deserve to die for hitting you?"

Scott thought about that and said nothing.

"Youth and ignorance surely don't apply in this case, Scott."

This was obviously a puzzle. There was a right answer, Scott knew, and he was trying to see it. How did the little boy relate to the guard to Jack Winters to- "It wouldn't be a fair fight," said Scott. "He doesn't know it, but I'm bigger than him."

* * *

"Oh my god," whined Bobby, "this is even more boring than regular school."

Xavier had decided to start educating the boys, following what he called a 'classical curriculum'. Scott had assumed that meant Mozart and Beethoven, but instead it was a lot of translating Greek and Latin.

Scott glanced at Bobby's page. "The thing that looks like a bent capital E is a sigma. It makes an ess sound."

"Seriously?" Bobby groaned. "Then I've been doing this all wrong." He turned his pencil around and started erasing. The eraser, already largely frozen, promptly broke off. He threw the pencil down on the table. "This sucks!"

"It's not supposed to be fun," said Scott. He was looking up Ἔλεος up in the dictionary. "The professor says control is like a muscle. Practicing controlling your attention strengthens your ability to control your powers."

"That sounds suspiciously like bullshit."

Scott shrugged indifferently. If the magical rich man who let him drive cars and bought him new clothes wanted him to translate Greek, he'd do it. There didn't have to be a point.

Bobby sighed dramatically and rubbed his hands together to warm them up before picking up a new eraser. (He kept accidentally chilling things around him – they'd tried playing basketball earlier, but the ball had frozen and shattered following a truly excellent three-point shot.)

Scott withheld a sigh. Bobby was annoying, but he was ultimately a nice kid. And it was good – sometimes, at least – to have someone else around the mansion. Scott had spent most of his life trying to avoid other people. This was partially because he was an introvert, and partially because most of the other people in his life had meant him harm. Bobby didn't mean Scott harm. Bobby didn't mean anyone harm, as far as Scott could tell. He was scared and angry about the mob that had come after him, but if he still cried at night about it, he did so silently. "Here," said Scott, shoving his first page across the table, "you can copy mine for the first couple of lines, but you have to do the rest yourself."

Bobby smiled, a lopsided, friendly grin. "Thanks, man. You're the best part of this place."

Scott blushed and was glad that no one could see his eyes through his glasses.

* * *

Again, Charles Xavier was Scott, in the dream. Scott still claimed he never remembered his dreams, even though he woke trembling and sweating, sometimes with a yelp or a whimper. He often lingered between sleep and wakefulness, trying to claw his way out of a dream that he couldn't identify, but dreaded resuming nonetheless. Charles' curiosity had led him to rationalize a second small intrusion, to convince himself that it was for Scott's own good.

There was something very unusual about the landscape of Scott's mind. The rooms were more like theater sets than real, tangible places. Ideas were unlinked to one another, so stimuli rarely evoked any consistent recollection. There was a lack of texture, as if walls had been colored by a perfect printer instead of the sort of improperly mixed paint that inevitably adorned a cheap children's home.

Scott-in-the-dream was lying in bed, awake and sweating terribly. There was another boy in the room, staring at him with a strange, unpleasant gaze. Something hurt unbearably, a pounding in his head matched by cold metal on his eyelid and a needle approaching his eye.

Scott-in-the-dream was running through a cornfield. He was barefoot and he was blind, but the corn was high enough to hide him.

Scott-in-the-dream was running his fingers over the wooden walls in a small, featureless room. He knocked every few moments, testing for weak points. The walls were paper and they burned to nothing.

Delicately, Charles retreated from Scott's mind. This wasn't medical trauma, not entirely. It didn't seem precisely real. It was…well, it wasn't good. Charles was sure of that.

* * *

The study was always musty and dimly lit.

"Scott," said Charles, "I thought about what you said several days ago, that I should reconsider my plans. I think you're right. There was a time when I had hoped to gather adult mutants, already mature in their abilities, but now I believe that goal is unrealistic. Mutants can't wait that long, suffering in isolation."

Scott wondered if this had anything to do with Erik, and if Charles was now planning to break his non-interference pledge.

"I've contacted three mutants with whom I have corresponded. Two responded favorably. The third, I believe we will have to convince in person." Charles leaned forward in a concerned sort of way. "Are you afraid of flying, Scott? Because I'm afraid it's an awfully long drive to Dunfee, Illinois."


End file.
